


Safe Places

by Smoakin_dontburnyourself



Category: Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, F/M, Introspection, Nightmares, Trauma, character study kind of, more peter centric, some MJ/Peter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-16
Updated: 2017-07-16
Packaged: 2018-12-03 01:30:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11521713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Smoakin_dontburnyourself/pseuds/Smoakin_dontburnyourself
Summary: Basically 5 times Peter doesn't say what he feels + 1 time he does





	Safe Places

**Author's Note:**

> I saw this movie yesterday and I LOVED it. I really liked Tom as Peter and of course Zendaya always slays my entire life. This is my humble offering into the fandom and as you will probably be able to tell, I'm sold on the MJ/ Peter relationship. 
> 
> The only warning I would say is that theres references to Anxiety/trauma/nightmares, beware
> 
> Thanks for reading !

 

It starts like most things do in his life these days, with a couple of very  _ bad _ guys. Arms dealers of sorts, the decidedly sinister kind, and the first real threat to the city since Vulture. He’s tracked them all the way to their evil lair, settled in an abandoned parking garage on the outskirts of the city. 

 

He’s perched behind a large rock that’s overlooking the garage, trying to listen in, and thinking out loud into the nighttime air

 

“What’s up with the  _ lame _ evil lairs?”  because, really, what's evil about an abandoned facility?

 

“They’re Inconspicuous. Good for criminal activity” Karen offers 

 

She’s right, of course, the trend is unmistakable. He mutters in reluctant agreement before asking her to map the area. 

 

“Should I activate  _ Instant Kill Mode _ ?”  

 

“Karen,  _ no killing _ , we’ve discussed this”

 

She makes a small noise of  acquiescence before pulling up a layout of the deteriorating structure. It comes up into the entirety of his field of view, he studies it carefully before picking a window on the east side as his mode of entry. 

As it turns out, the inner workings of the lair are a lot less lame by any standards. There’s tech all over the walls, some he’s never seen, and some he’s only ever seen fleetingly at the Avengers tower during his very brief visit. Besides that, though, it's oddly  _ empty _ .

 

He doesn’t figure it out until it's too late.

 

“Peter! The building is going to-” Karen’s in his head, but it's already happening 

 

The structure explodes with little fuss, silently crumbling from the bottom up. 

 

There’s no water this time, no immediate impending doom, no evil dude turned father of his crush with wings, just  _ pressure _ . Just the same ringing in his ears. Just the same alarmingly familiar panic clawing up his throat. He can’t breathe, he needs help.  _ Please, someone help _ . 

 

Karen’s voice comes in and out. He hears her telling him to push, that he’s stuck under the rubble,  _ the building has collapsed, Peter. There’s still no tracker in the suit, Mr. Stark won’t know you’re here. _

 

He can’t breathe. He can’t think over the raging headache throbbing at his temples.  _ He can’t _

 

He hears Karen telling him which pieces to move, how to escape, he just needs to push. His hands are trapped and something in the suit has shattered, he can feel it.

 

_ If you’re nothing without the suit, then you shouldn’t have it.  _ Except he  _ is  _ something, even without the suit, he knows it, he’s proven it before. He proves it again.

 

Once the dust settles and he’s made it back through his bedroom window, he lays awake. He thinks of everything and nothing at all. His wounds are fresh and his skin is bruised. There's a quiet panic somewhere in his chest, it's blunt and dry and  _ there _ .

 

The guys he followed ended up being somewhat of a decoy. They knew he was trailing them and lead him around while the rest of the gang moved the high tech guns upstate. He called Tony and passed the proverbial baton to the Avengers. 

 

“They exploded  _ what _ on you?” 

 

“A parking garage” 

 

“Kid, are you-?”

 

“Fine, yeah, I’m Fine” 

 

“Peter, you know it's okay to not be fine all the time”

 

“I’m good, Mr. Stark, I’m good”

 

Peter leaves out the part about having done this before, about feeling the pressure, even in his sleep. He wakes up panting sometimes, sweat dripping on his skin,  _ Please, someone help.  _ He doesn’t tell Mr. Stark that either.

 

Three days later he’s watching news coverage on the arrests from his couch.

  
  
  
  
  


…...

  
  
  


Michelle brings it up during their second local Decathlon trip. She uses the term anxiety. It makes Peter frown. 

 

“No, I-” 

 

“Peter, you were sweating bullets in the elevator” She says “and in the stairwell-” 

 

they’re walking together, behind the rest of the group who has decided to take pictures in central park “-and at the very thought of going up into lady liberty” Her tone isn’t probing, it isn’t judgemental or asking. Her eyes are soft, her culs wild and whipping with the light breeze. She leans into him as they walk, matching yellow blazers nearly touching at the seam of their shoulders. 

 

“Is there a point in me denying this?” he asks, knowing Michelle to be the most quietly observant person he’s ever met. The fact of the matter is, she wouldn’t have brought it up unless she already  _ knew _ .    

 

She shrugs noncommittally, giving him an out

 

Peter stares down onto his shoes before saying “I have this thing about confined spaces” 

 

he doesn’t tell her about the rubble, about being trapped, about the unrelenting pressure, the panic. He doesn’t think he can, doesn’t think he’s told anyone at all.

 

Turns out he doesn’t have to, because then Mr.Harrington is calling them over for a team picture. Michelle nods and then shoots him a rare grin before pulling him by his sleeve

 

“Say _ cheese! _ ” Mr. Harrington says, fidgeting with the camera so that everyone is in frame.

 

Peter smiles into the camera, muttering  _ cheese! _ , and feeling as though some of the pressure has been lifted off his shoulders as the camera flashes and the team disintegrates into laughter. 

  
  
  


…...

  
  
  


Peter is fine, _ he's fine _ , at least he would be fine, were he not trapped in some sort of metal container unable to get out. The door is armed, his suit isn’t helping,  _ It’ll probably remain closed until morning _ , he needs to get out, he can’t breathe, he needs to-

 

“Karen! Karen- Call Ned!” 

 

“ _ Calling Ned Leeds _ ” 

 

“Hey Peter! D’you change your mind about coming over? My moms making spaghetti-”

 

“listen, Ned, I’m trapped, I’m stuck and I cant- I cant-, I need to get out of here”  _ I can’t breathe _ , he wants to say,  _ it’s happening again _ , but his lungs are burning and he feels as though the walls are closing in

 

“Woah, Peter, slow down, where are you?”

 

Peter calms his breathing enough to tell him

 

Ned hacks the door alarm with some high tech gear that Mr. Stark gave him as some kind of  _ Guy in the chair _ starter pack. He’s grateful for it, he’s also grateful for the reassuring hand that Ned places on his shoulder the next day at school. 

  
  


…...

  
  


Happy doesn’t seem, well….. _ Happy _ . Not that Peter has ever really heard him sound especially cheerful, but today, on the drive back to his apartment, Happy sounds somber at best.

 

“Can’t win em all, Kid” he says, his voice slicing through the thick silence of the car. Peter can feel Happy’s eyes on him through the rearview mirror, maybe he’s trying to asses the damage. Peter knows he should probably say something to let him know that he’s okay, still Peter Parker, still the fifteen year old wanna-be avenger. 

 

He knows he should, but he can’t bring himself to say anything at all, not now, not after everything. Absentmindedly, Peter wonders if it gets easier, to be yourself, to be who you want after seeing all that you  _ aren’t _ . Because what kind of hero lets people  _ die _ , right? Sometimes, he looks at Tony and thinks that maybe it does. And he can’t help but be scared at the thought.

 

_ Can’t win em all _ , he tosses it around in his head. He guesses it's true enough, simple statistics. Except today, they  _ did _ win, Tony and all the honorary members of the Avengers, they defeated the monster, wiped out the threats, saved the city, possibly the  _ world _ . 

 

Still, Peter nods, knowing exactly what Happy’s referring to.  _ Collateral damage _ , it sounds ugly, even in his own head. 

 

“This is you, Kid” Happy says, through the silence and the darkness of his street. It’d been raining, and the night smells like the aftermath of a storm.

 

_ Say something, anything, he’ll think you’re traumatized or something, he’ll tell Mr. Stark, they’ll bench you, you’ll never be an Avenger……. _

 

“Thanks” Peter mutters, pulling something like a smile onto his face

 

It might not be enough but Happy seems to understand. He pats him on the back and helps him with his luggage.

 

…...

  
  


“I’m fine” it's become a mantra for him, a sort of defense mechanism against all the times when he’s decidedly not  _ fine _ .

 

He says it now, to May, as she rubs his back in the stillness of his dark room

 

“Peter, you were screaming in your sleep, honey”

 

“Just a nightmare” he says, and it's true, he has them sometimes. Occupational hazard, he figures.

 

“Shouldn’t have had that milk” he jokes, but even in the dark, he can see May’s eyes shine with concern

 

He want’s to tell her about the guilt he feels, about the crushing weight it has on his thoughts. He want’s to tell her how it feels when he can’t save everyone, how the screams of innocent people echo inside him when he feels empty.

 

He want’s to, but he can’t. 

 

So he settles for sobbing quietly, the reassuring gravity of May’s hand keeping him together in the darkness. 

  
  
  


…...

  
  


One year into Michelle’s reign as team captain finds them back at the nation’s capital. 

 

They skip the monument, for obvious reasons, which they choose not to discuss, again, for obvious reasons. 

 

It’s the night before the competition, there's a soft knock, and Peter swings the door open to find Michelle standing on the other side, wearing something that looks suspiciously like a bathing suit.  

 

“We’re all sneaking into the pool, team bonding activity” she explains, watching him rub sleep off his face from the lit entrance of his room

 

“Wait...Now?”

 

She looks only a little impatient and says “Yes, Peter... _ Now _ ”

 

Peter lifts lifts his palms, the sign of surrender “Alright, I’ll wake Ned”

 

Ten minutes later they’re in swimming trunks, making sure the coast is clear before jumping over the small gate leading into the pool.

 

“I thought you didn’t  _ do _ team bonding activities” he asks Michelle once the rest of the team is settled into two teams, playing water basketball with a ball and net that was apparently left behind. They’re up to their knees in water, sitting over the edge of the kiddy pool.

 

Michelle shrugs like she has nothing to say on the matter, then pauses and surprises Peter by saying “I know I’m no Liz” she's watching her feet paddle chlorine blue water “but this team means a lot to me too”

 

“Michelle” he says, after a moment of comfortable silence “no one expects you to be like Liz, no one expects you to be like anyone” his hand finds hers on the rough concrete of the pool’s edge. He places his open palm over her wrist in a way he hopes is encouraging

 

“You’re  _ you _ ” their conversation is quiet and lost into the excited chatter of their teammates. They sit side by side in soft friendship that promises to spill over the brim and into the uncharted territory of  _ more _ .

 

“And I think that's amazing,  _ you’re _ amazing Michelle, I mean that”

 

Michelle smiles and nods like maybe she isn’t quite sure what to say. The air between them is thick with what Peter assumes is the afterglow of a confession. It's the start of something, they both know it then, in the middle of the night at a motel pool in Washington D.C 

  
The start of something  _ good _ . 


End file.
